Diversity And Marginalization

Hexi Corridor, a region of bordering on different areas, is not only the land of strategic hub, but also the earliest and most important channels in economic and cultural exchanges. It has been a cultural heritage of the world's four ancient civilizations. Different types of climate and diverse topography, such as snow-capped mountains, grasslands, Gobi, desert, wetlands and oases, constitute Hexi Corridor an exceptional area, in addition to its characteristics of multiethnic cultures, farming and nomadic civilizations, religion and Confucianism. So we can say that special geographical environment directly affects its composition of material production and cultural creation there. The culture heterogeneity in Hexi Corridor enriches the cultural growth of the Central Plains. It has clear distinction with the urban culture in Chang'an and Luoyang, the livestock-based culture in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, Tibetan culture and nomadic culture in Mongolia plateau. Hexi Corridor was not originally a living region as a transportation hub, Confucianism and cultural transmission, but as a part of the cultural matrix which conceived 'the dawn of Chinese civilization. After the mixture of farming culture in Central Plains and nomadic culture of the minority Shanrong in Hexi Corridor, a certain new and initial culture was created——the dominant farming culture with some elements of nomadic." With the changes of history, the Hexi culture is constantly enriched. Hexi Corridor is one of the three major national corridors in China, and its culture is splendid and irreplaceable, which has contributed a lot to many fields of disciplines, such as Dunhuang Studies, ethnology, history, archeology, anthropology, etc..Literature is an important part of culture. Hexi Corridor was ever the culture center of ancient West of China (barring Shaanxi), and the literary style there is forceful and high-spirited. Since the founding of New China, Hexi contemporary literature is beginning to recover along with the "Westward Movement" and has been the golden age of literary achievements——less fruitful but the same singularity as that in other regional literature——in 21st century, especially after the great development in the 1980-90s. From the beginning of "Root-seeking Literature"in the 1980s, regional literature has become a topic subject in Chinese modern and contemporary literary studies, and it involves in a vast territory including northeast of China, Tibet, Guanzhong area as well as the culture in Shanxi, Shandong, Hunan and Sichuan provinces. Those regions are all the sources of Chinese culture, which needs further study for continuous and better development. In view of this, the dissertation tries to be made for two goals:one is to summarize literary achievements of contemporary literature in Hexi; the other is to make an exploration for culture development from the perspective of literary study.It is necessary for any studies to firstly make clear the context, condition and significance of topics——contemporary literature (including the works by some influential writers) in Hexi, and the reason why it plays an important role in Gansu province even in China is a key question to be discussed. Then six chapters are provided in this dissertation.The first chapter focuses on the historical and geographical contexts of several key terms involved in the study. The second tries to explain the "national mental structure", whose origins are mainly involved in pottery art, Hexi myths, Confucian and religious culture. It is a vital factor that has shaped different writing styles on Hexi contemporary literature.The third chapter takes up a famous writer, Xuemo, who has greatly influenced on Hexi contemporary fiction. From the perspective of Hexi culture, his fictions are studied in order to describe the features of multi-culture. I devote the fourth chapter to other novelists. Their representative novels are selected out to reveal their artistic features by close reading with overall explanations.The fifth chapter is divided into several sections to study poetry among Hexi contemporary literary genre. A large number of influential poets are mentioned and the common quality of their works is obtained for a full interpretation, of course, including case study. The sixth chapter is an overview of prose in Hexi, however, the two prosers, Tiemor and Yang Xianping, are discussed more details so as to achieve the core ideas of their prose-writing.I conclude the dissertation that bears literary changes, conditions, ideas. style and features of Hexi contemporary literature, and manage to explore the cultural patterns and "unconscious" factors of its development on the basis of interpretation in multi-cultural context.